Anatomy of a Hero
by electricsymphony
Summary: Damon never returns home from war, dying alone and forgotten in Confederate battle, his last thoughts a myriad of questions and musings of the world he's leaving behind, and the only woman who ever gave it any life. 1864 AU; can be read as AH depending on the lens which viewed from. Assuredly D/K.


**Notes: **Alright, so this piece here has a bit of explanation and precedent that I feel I need to address first, mainly because this is kind of two stories in one. Originally, I started this story with every intention of having it be a D/K piece based on the possibility that Damon somehow found out that Katherine was never in the tomb immediately upon transition, and his subsequent search for her over the years and decades following up to present day. I still may do a way longer piece on that in the future, who knows. If you guys think it's a good idea, let me know and it's more likely to happen.

But, as it turns out, this one morphed into something else entirely. Due to time constraints and a long sickness, I needed an original story (i.e. not blatantly fan-fiction) and I needed it faster than I could write it. So, with a little re-vamping (no pun intended) and a bit of an add-on, I managed this. Now, since this was originally a piece about Damon transitioning and I modified it into a story about a Confederate solider in his last moments after being fatally wounded on the battlefield, you could rightly assume that it kind of isn't completely about Damon anymore. And yet, as I read it and re-read it, all I conceptualize is Damon, and Katherine and Stefan and Giuseppe subsequently, so although there are no direct references to Damon or Stefan by name (Katherine is referenced by name once), I still read it as a TVD fanfiction rather than an original story. And I thought you guys probably would too.

So, that's why I'm posting it here. For me, at its core, this is still a D/K fic, just minus the overtly obvious vampire references. I'd love it if you let me know what you guys think in that regard, and whether you think it functions as both a fanfic and an original piece, I'd be interested in your opinions on that. But either way I will post it as a fanfic, because really... who is it hurting? What my Creative Writing Professor doesn't know won't hurt her... ;)

This is basically a melting pot of D/K loving, Damon-angst and descriptive imagery. Since there are no direct vampire references, this is why I alluded to it being possibly read as an AH as well as an AU in the summary descrip, but again, depends on your perspective.

* * *

He wakes up with a searing headache and sore limbs, head quirked askew and tree bark bitter and unpleasant in his mouth. An unintelligible groan falls from his lips as he hoists his body up, his throat scalding hot as though he'd bitten his tongue. His fingers grip thin patches of grass and dirt beneath him, but his limbs ache far too much to sufficiently support his body. There's a sharp sting just below his chest and he presses two fingers against it, wincing immediately, retracting his fingers and hissing at the contact. As he lifts his shirt up—frayed at the seams, as though someone had toasted the cloth in a wood-fire oven—, a distinct, bullet wound hole lies just left of his breastbone.

As his blurry vision gradually focuses, he squints painful tears from his eyes and narrows in on a figure not too far off in the distance. They're coming closer, and his nostrils are flooded with familiarity, shocked into astonishment. Such a sharp, keen sense of smell is so unfamiliar to his frail, aching body—so stunningly intensified that it takes him a moment to fully comprehend. In such an intense state of injury, he'd expect his senses to be dulled, but they're _amplified—_so clear, so crisp; he can feel the faintest brush of autumn leaves against his bare arms, can smell the pungent odor of wood burning in the distance.

The mysterious shadow looms ever closer now and he makes a futile attempt to reach out and _grab—_the very core of his being recognizes next to nothing in this unfamiliar and dim canvas of agony, nothing but this blurry outline radiating such a comforting warmth that his cold, bruised body yearns out for in a plea of desperation.

"K'th…rine…" this final grumble (_question?)_ escapes his pale, blue lips before he slumps back down to the ground, arms gripped tightly across his chest and eyes squeezed painfully tight. In the blackness behind his eyes, a roaring and cackling fire sweeps across the landscape, taking with it his bruised and battered body, his exhausted and confused consciousness, his torn and broken heart—a wide array of plentiful emotions blending into one colorless grey _ache_ of pain_. _

* * *

When he stirs from his delirium for the second time, his body jolts off the hard ground in a quick, torturous lurch. His eyes slowly adjust to the blinding light of sunrise, a bitter, numbing taste in his mouth and his throat uncomfortably hoarse. He remembers screams of anguish, the red-hot heat of a raging fire, a quick and swift bullet piercing his heart—but most of all, he remembers a set of concerned doe brown eyes, the subtle tickle of brunette curls against his cheek and the quiet whisper of a lover's reassurance.

His arms are slack and sore at his sides, both fists curled but not clenched, and the gentle whip of wind feels cool on his face. The noises had not dissipated, but only grown closer and more deafening since the initial blow. He could hear muffled voices, gruff baritones yelling out distraught commands, the sharp pitch of their desperation reverberating in his ears—as though sound, time, his very _existence _had stalled and slowed to nothing but this one fleeting moment.

He conjures up images of her soft, full lips, imagines his gunpowder stained fingers tracing the delicate twists of her corset lacings, feels the teasing brush of her fingertips stroke against his own, tastes the indescribable bittersweet of her bruising kisses, envisions her small frame curled so perfectly within the once sturdy grip of his arms.

He may only be marginally conscious, but as combat rages all around him, he knows of two haunting, inevitable truths. The first, that he is unquestionably dying—lying stiff as a board against the hard, green earth, the circulation of blood into and out of his heart slowing to a gradual, calmed still. The second, that the scattered and fading images of her in his mind's eye would disintegrate into nothing but memories, memories that would be put to eternal rest along with his cold, dead body in a shallow grave—more hollow even than that of his pride.

A third, stinging realization pains his conscious as he sees not a memory but a premonition—his beloved clothed in a delicate, innocent white that has never suited her, standing alongside his child brother before a row of ornate pews, her small hand encased tight in that of her newly betrothed. He can imagine the look of anguish on his kid brother's pale, smooth face as he receives word of his own mortality, he can see the reluctant and pained smile of eventual realization, can watch as his little brother plays the part of clip-on gentleman, as he gallantly offers his sleeve to dry the tears of _his _woman, of his _everything_.

As the backdrop of battle and bloodshed—a blurry and unfocused palette of blue and grey—slowly disappear behind a curtain of black, he ponders whether there will be another him one day—whether his heroism for a cause of Southern pride he neither cares for nor believes in will grant him a namesake. He wonders whether his death will one day produce a little boy who will hear stories of an old, long forgotten, decades ago buried war hero that shares his name and picture someone with far more courage and valor than the real 'hero' ever had. He wonders whether he finds this idea appealing.

He takes in a last, gasping inhale of oxygen and thinks _no, _he hopes there will never be a boy named in his image. After all, in myth and superstition, namesakes are often doomed to meet the same fate as their predecessor. In this lonely, pitiful graveyard of his own strangled musings, he knows only one thing for certain—he would _never_ doom a fate so desolate to even the worst of children, not for a grand statue of recognition, not for eternal honor—not even for the wonderfully vivid but fading memories of her soft breath moulded against his pale lips.


End file.
